Fallen Earth Development Blog - the journey of turning Fallen Earth into a Free2Play experience

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

June State of the Game

It’s been a busy month for us at FE – not only are we moving
forward and making good progress with the Dome – with a special thanks to
everyone who has been able to help out on the PTS, we’re working on the AP
Augmentation system and putting the finishing touches on the preproduction
design for the next couple of features we will be going into production on
after we get the Dome and augmented weapons on live.

At the same time, we are working on optimizing and improving
our server code to improve the overall experience, specifically targeting the
latency that you may have noticed around chat and looting (and sometimes other
stuff like vaults). This remedy is in the works, and once complete, will also end
our current practice of doing 2 restarts a week. Unfortunately, we will have to
continue doing twice weekly restarts until more of these changes are in (some
are already in place), but we promise it is only being done to create a
smoother play experience overall until that time.

So, what are the next features?

PvP-

After The Dome is released Tee Affo will be working on a new
in world non-instanced PVP scenario. This will give PvP’ers a new objective to
fight over while making use of their existing space. While we want to give
players more ways to play the game the way they want to we don’t want to spread
the community too thin or create more of a scenario where it takes to long for
PvPers to get to the relevant battles.

While we’re on the subject of relevant battles, I wanted to
take a moment to address an issue we’ve been seeing more of as of late. Without
going in to too many unnecessary details I wanted to remind everyone that
entering a PvP zone is supposed to be risky. There is a good chance you will
get into a situation you cannot fight your way out of and may need to Fast
Travel to escape. It would behoove you
to prepare for this possible outcome.

Additionally, building a PvP community can be a difficult
thing that takes a certain amount of cooperation, instruction, patience and the
concept of fair play – it is, however, really easy to shrink a community. So in the interest of getting more people to
willingly engage in high level PvP – don’t be a jerk. We don’t actually want GM’s to babysit you
guys or over regulate world PvP

TLDR - Don’t cloner camp.
It’s cheap PvP and it weakens the community as a whole.

PvE-

While Tee is working on PVP, Ninja, Never and I will be hard
at work on building out a new area for everyone to explore, build, defend and
enjoy. We will be pulling back a bit more of the radiation surrounding the
canyon and starting to answer some of the most frequently asked questions –
What was GlobalTech really doing with clones? What do the Outsiders want? And
my favorite – is there anything left outside the Grand Canyon?

Our new section isn’t going to be a county in the same way
Alpha was, instead of going from mission hub to mission hub, (which is fun –
but we do have a bit of that) we’re looking at new ways for players to explore
and uncover plot in the area while still focusing on letting the players drive
the content while building off of the existing features that players enjoy.

I just recently returned after a long Hiatus. I think thedevs have truly missed the big thing here. This is not a PvP game. It is (or was at one point) a truly massive crafting/pve game with areas you had to fight each other in as well. The PvP is only a small aspect of this game.The way they have constantly OverWorked the PvP side is why things have gone downhill so much.This game was never meant to have two different player types. Seggregating Pve/Pvp is the big problem. The guy out Scavenging should be quite comfortable walking into a PvP zone if he is willing to take on the hazards of fighting a Non-AI player.The changes to make it basically two groups, either your in the PvP group or ur in the Pve group has been the death toll for this once great game. DeathToll items should never have been introduced. People that want to play a COD type game should not ever be here.This is NOT COD or similar type game.

Further too that. If they had any sense they would have looked at historical games that have had both going on. A good example was Ultima Online. As the Devs further mucked things up, the game slowly died.They had it right initially, then they thought they could do what every one else has tried and failed at. Anything that makes the PvP easier will completely kill any game of this type.

"TLDR - Don’t cloner camp. It’s cheap PvP and it weakens the community as a whole. "

Cloner camping comes from poor level design. Simply update the cloners with 3 separate exits, Yes fast travel is a nice escape as well. I know some cloners/safe zones have multiple ways to escape and they never have major issues with players being cloner camped.

Any good level designer knows industry standard you need 3 ways in and out of a room. Having done level design for couple years now I have learned this issue first hand and that this industry standard holds true.

If the 3 exits are covered for escape that means a lot of players are involved in camping and it would be wise to just port out. But having 3 exits opens more capability's to escape.

I am going to have to disagree with the reason you have chosen for the PvP community being incredibly small. You had a HUGE PvP community back before 2.4 patch when you nerfed free to play and decided to milk money from the harvesters. The district as it is now called is DEAD and the huge player base that made that region their home is gone, you took away haietta our favorite pvp ground. What killed the PvP aspect of the game is constant bad decisions from the G1 Team as a whole. GORE put the final nail in the coffin for most of your paying vets who have quit the game, some of which are still paying for subscriptions even though they no longer play. The last patch for the mutation skill lines was a great patch a few issues here and there most got fixed with in 2 weeks however there are still a few issues. The best way to build a community in your game is to LISTEN to them because they play your game, they test out all of the builds and the weapons. However you are LOSING your community because you don't listen to them, you say you do but nothing comes from it, how long have we been complaining about gore being the thing that killed PVP and suggested many ways it could be fixed? Almost a year now? Yet it is still broken and still needs balancing. There are skill lines that need to be tweaked, Beast might needs to be resisted or the health cost needs to be larger than what it is. The Debuffs in the sector 3 zones for 55s still needs a fix we were told you were looking into it, yet still 55's are allowed to use their high level skill lines that haven't been nerfed against newer players. If you want to build a decent PvP player base/community you should start by listening to the one you already have and are losing fast.

Trash talking and cloner camping has been around for a long time and it happens on both sides. It is a part of every game that has any sort of PvP, its harmless banter going back and forth from both sides of the wheel.

anonymous.. good job for one (sarcasm) .. second .. this is about typical.. and a good reason why the devs don't listen to you.. mainly cause you don't like what they do.. doesn't mean that they suck because they don't listen to you.. its because they get their information from the forums.. (the same place you are complaining).. and most of the ppl that dont like the way it is complain on the forums.. equals to roughly 10% of the games population.. and the ppl that like what the devs are doing are not on the forums .. they are playing the game.. now.. how do the devs decide what to do.. well they have to weed out the bs.. and say "what would they like.. " .. their answer is.. "dunno".. then they change something.. and ohhh.. lets say 50% of games population says you suck.. then it was bad.. but if the 10% of population says it sucks.. then its not to bad.. and carry on..

so.. how do we solve this problem.. well.. get in the freakin game.. get all the ppl you know.. and get all the ppl they know.. so on and so forth.. and petition it.. then and only then will the devs listen.. until then.. if you dont like the game.. dont play..

The problem is quite a bit of the stuff against has been proactive...they got a backlash about gore(a clan was made and the majority of pvpers supported or joined it). Even after the changes/nerfs numbers and where the issue lies has been pointed out etc.

At the end of the day stuff looks more like a brick wall and people wander off...nevermind they told open world to gtfo and in turn buffed bs to high hell. And the incentive for open world is the gtc...which is largely controlled through s2/s3.

Firstly what is with all the .. ? Secondly i am an very active player of Fallen Earth and more recently i have become part of the Wastelander engineer - Decon Team. Also i was not just targeting to the devs, i said the G1 Team as a whole. When gore first came out the "main" pvp community which includes all of the main clans of the factions such as heretic, exile, saints, public enemy and game over etc, got together and made a different clan (REMOVE PATCH 2.5)and had to threaten to grief the GORE event that the G1 team had planned for them to start listening to us. They said they were going to look into it back then, yet a year later the weapons are still not balanced in the slightest.

Do you PvP? Have you gone against the Jackal and the lunatic and some one with decent aim with the bastards? How long do you last? Do you feel that the other weapons are on par with GORE? I have been playing the game for just over a year not as long as some of my clan and friends but long enough to know i enjoy playing the game a lot. Seeing the direction that the team have put this game in actually saddens me a little. I plan to resub for the game but not until it gets better thankfully most of the stuff i can get on the market place is now tradeable and on the AH as getting chips is pretty easy i just buy it all from there.

I've pushed through bad patches and bad decisions hoping that they will start to listen and do something about the slowly dying pvp community. There have been votes and petitions and forum posts on this. They are not listening to the i'd say 80% of their community, Including the ones that have quit playing but still stick around on the forums and checking out new patches hoping that the game is better.

Also for the person above, they are probably an enforcer or trav either way it's not just about GORE there have been many things that the G1 team have done in FE that have pushed away many members of the community. this game is becoming more Pay to Play instead of Free to play since patch 2.4. Like i said if they want to build a community in PvP they should listen to the ones they have currently and the ones that stick around on the forums hoping to get the good old days back. A little bad criticism here and there is good and they shouldn't ignore it.

"When gore first came out the "main" pvp community which includes all of the main clans of the factions such as heretic, exile, saints, public enemy and game over etc, got together and made a different clan (REMOVE PATCH 2.5)and had to threaten to grief the GORE event that the G1 team had planned for them to start listening to us. They said they were going to look into it back then, yet a year later the weapons are still not balanced in the slightest."

I was there when remove patch 2.5 clan was gathered outside of LA and it is obvious you "heard" what you wanted to hear. What tiggs said to everyone in the Remove Patch 2.5 clan was, you grief this event you will be banned and sure enough everyone stood down. They looked into it and they did changed the stats on the GORE weapons, of course not as much as people wanted. People's problem in this game with GORE is before GORE they were the top of the food chain, they could take out anyone. After GORE even new players now stood a chance of beating them. It all comes down to GORE leveled the playing field and the people who used to be at the top are pissed they are no longer there.

Haha trying to state new players could be "good" with GORE, no it's stupid that once we get our hands on GORE it's 2-3 shot city. It's a skill-less weapon, not having to apply debuffs to get 350-400 crits?

I also like how people are replying Anonymously, makes it funny since most people saying GORE is "balanced" have no realistic proof nor provide any real feedback (ever)

After playing several mmo's....spawn/clone camping has been around for ever. It is cheap.....period. Have I ever done this? Yes. Was I cheap for doing it? Yes. Have I thought it better to not do it and still get enjoyment out of pvp? Yes.

In saying this, and after having spent the last decade playing pvp in mmo's I can say that there are a certain % of people that are just, for a lack of a better word, jerks. The type that would run up the score in a sporting match. The kind that would hit someone below the belt. The kind that would kick sand in your eyes. Finally, yes, spawn/clone camp you because to them it is fun to not even give you a chance.

This is an sad but inevitable part of pvp because this is the world we live in. Dog eat dog, win at all costs. The only way this can be prevented is to implement rules or a certain area around clone/spawn areas that make players immune to attack. This would allow the people being camped time and space to mount a counter attack against the enemy.

Sure, fast traveling to another location is a viable option, but why limit the possibilities of a more balanced and fair pvp system that would prohibit or reduce spawn camping? In the end, I think people will get the same level of enjoyment out of pvp, if not more, if we change how much time is spent camping the cloning facilities.

If "being a jerk" is request to stop trash-talking,PVP has already has trash talking, not to mention the fact most of it happens in local. There's more trash talking in other games and in a harsher manner than FE has ever seen.

Cloner camping has only been an issue in Blockade, elsewhere it would be due to the fact a player PVP flagged. This, is the player's mistake. There is no babysitting requires if you place the cloner outside of Blockade.

All and all I'm up for changes in PVP as long as PVP in open world becomes worth the DT. However with Bloodsports in it's current state there's NO reason to open PVP except to harvest.

Cloner camping is almost all what is left of PVP all these people making S2-S3 toons or quitting because of GORE and other reasons... THAT being said i doubt someone has quit over cloner camping if you do not like or do not want to be cloner camped do not /pvp flag in the first place... Stop crying! if cloner camping will be bannable then more people will leave..

Updates dont come fast enough, how long is it since you 1st said the dome was due out, how many bugs will it have as BS still has loads, PvP is a joke due to the number of hacks out there and yes i went to a site and tried a few and they do work, took me about 25 mins to do it with a different account to my main one just to show it could be done. Have i given the game up...yes for now as its a joke, sorry to say it but its true, will i still check in now and then to see if its any better then yes, do they have a problem with no EU based staff of course they do, get someone to work a night shift in the US

How about fixing existing pvp zones?The foothills can only have one harvester, you need to spread the forts further apart to allow 3.They also need all the town infrastructure.Fixing alpha would be good too.If you're going to make the new zone as incomplete as the above 2, what's the point?

Great that you're working on new content but for the sake of this game your should seriously consider to improve what we already have. PvE in Fallen Earth is boring as hell, mobs got the worst AI ever seen, they do not provide a decent challenge and make the whole PvE feel really not exciting.This is imho still the biggest drawback in FE, and all my friends let the game because of this. After all these years you just did nothing about and now your going to add more: it's all about quantity but you never focus on quality!!

ive been playing for about 4 mo lv 19 im not sure everything about pvp or this clone camping if someone new was reading these like me not sure exactly what your talking about. me im still pve, someone mentoned boring maybe a little i found it just takes so loong to lvl up it looks like lv 15 to 20 not much there to see as far as stuff for me the player, i discoverd the AH there was finally an area to get some good stuff. i see some stuff avl after lv 20 then maybe a little after lvll 30 and then nothing till 55. this is my first game like this its kinda cool, fulfilling some of whats already there/enhancing would probably be good a little more creative injunuity. i think ive noticed some of the gaps ive read about here. ive finally got to where i could talk to merchants in sec 2, and ive only found a town that attacks me and no missions execpt in thoren bluff it could be forcing me to lean to one of these factions things im learning about but once out of sec1 things start to get focued one way or the other ijust wanted to experience more of sec 1 but better it dosent seem to be there..no need for reply no offence

The Dev's dont reply as they dont like negative comments, if your nice and play ball with them and suck up saying how great they are then fine....you disagree and point out the games failings they ban you or block you on Facebook. Facts are they dont want to correct whats wrong with the game they just want to ram new sales items and content down your throat each week, when was the last time anything was done for free oh thats right the grinch for about 2 mins....fix the bugs and balance and maybe you will get players back and not moaning

So, i get trash talked all the time and i give a little back now and then. I've been told that i use hacks and the reasoning behind my usage of hacks was my Father touched me when i was a child. I had a week or two of constant questions from a member of condemned about my real life and what my life style is and was constantly reminded how the player was "better" than me because he apparently worked for a hospital or something. Then there is the generic trash talk that everyone gets telling me that i suck, i need to learn how to play and that i should suck their dicks etc. None of which has ever pushed me away from the game.

What pushes me away from the game is the lack of communication from the G1 Team as a whole alongside G.O.R.E being stupidly over powered to the point where the game is no longer about skill. Sure a skilled player will sometimes come on top but skill no longer defines a win or a loss, now PvP is very melee heavy mostly with lunatics + Jackals (Melee+Rifle builds) and mostly builds with primal in them which we all know primal can not be resisted and is a FREE skill shot every 5 seconds as it only takes away Health points. Which is the easiest resource in the game to manage especially if there is more than one of you, due to the fact your team mates can cross heal you.

I get that bad comments/criticism is not all that wonderful to read and especially if it's a lot of the community giving it. However if so many people are complaining and trying to give constructive feed back on things that are ruining the game then you need to suck it up and try to listen to them. Remember you're developing the game and from what you have said and GMs have said you don't have much time to PLAY the game. So you wont know if this and that is balanced or if this and that is working correctly unless we tell you and it's not always going to be good news especially when it comes to PvP.

Fallen earth has a "unique" style of game play when it comes to pvp and it keeps us coming back whether its just on the forums or not we are still here wanting to come back and play the game we enjoy playing. However with the way things i don't think many of us will come back for more than a few weeks after the next patch to get the new weapons/armor and test them out then go back to playing other games because shit will be broken and not fixed.

Since you've made this blog post, the clonercamping only got more and more. You didn't forbit it and hence everyone reads it as "GO CLONERCAMPING NAO".I really doubt that was your intent with this post. So please, with sugar on top... MAKE A REAL STATEMENT and not just "yeah, maybe... maybe not".

I agree with the comments concerning GORE spoiling PVP. I no longer do end game PvP and have instead created new characters to explore more of the PvE world.

I found I missed a lot of my first play through and at the same time realize why so many players grind through levels to get to 55 as quickly as possible.

There is no real incentive to explore the outlying world. No hidden hard to find areas that give a decent reward to those willing to explore and find them. In addition I always find myself disappointed after after soloing a high level boss that takes ages to kill and the loot is worse than the loot you get from normal NPC's. There is just no incentive to play the storyline at all.

Personally I feel if you want to increase the player base then give the players a decent incentive to play the PvE storyline.Give the players specific skills, mutations and buffs in line and appropriate to the build line they are taking.Each build should have skills and mutations only available to that specific build, if they try to diversify and include everything just to get the specific skills or mutations then their end game will suffer.

I would like to see specific gear available to every build with strict requirements. No more rush to 55 and buy it all on auction house regardless of you skill level or set.

Make the build path important from the start, make wrong choices mean something and get players to put some thought into the direction their game takes.

Do developers ever learn not to introduce weapons that vastly unbalance the mmo? Then the next step in the fudge-up is always they cut-off communication with the community.

When you introduce something like GORE it creates an endless cycle: GORE is overpowered so you nerf primal, which ticks off non-GORE melee peeps; then BECAUSE OF GORE, vastly higher stated armor is introduced, which makes a vast portion of prior, non-GORE weapons obsolete...etc, etc...so on

Most mmos that do this almost always end up on the brink of pulling the plug? How about getting a little input from the community first?

Actually, last time I checked, some places outside the GCP were alive. In one of the LifeNet quests (forgot which) you can read an error log detailing a login attempt from the airport in Denver. Still Colorado, but outside the game setting.

Who the F*** was it in this current retarded generation that decided that two or three full stops are a suitable replacement for a comma? There's a COMMA key on your f****** keyboard, find it, use it. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,